The Late Show: Pondering evil (w/poll)

The fearsome, word-and-thought-defying banality of evil.  ~ Hannah Arendt

This is probably more appropriate for a Friday or Saturday night diary, but, then again, this is supposedly the most depressing day of the year. Maybe it's all the torture talk. Maybe it's the words and images of the horrors that we as humans can inflict on one another. Whether it be through war or greed or just cold, indifferent neglect.

How, I want to know, can we do such evil to one another?

more ramblings below

In West Side Story

We're no good, we're no good!
We're no earthly good,
Like the best of us is no damn good!
The trouble is he's crazy.
The trouble is he drinks.
The trouble is he's lazy.
The trouble is he stinks.
The trouble is he's growing.
The trouble is he's grown.

Fast forward 40 years.

I'm  channel surfing and come across the bizarre image of Pat Robertson giving advice to viewers who called in with their problems. Religious questions, questions about scripture, please explain the meaning of the Flood--these I could have handled. But I sit there glued as Robertson, flanked by two blond, coiffed, women with perfect posture, answered questions like "My husband just told me that he's gay. What should I do?" Over and over, Robertson answered with a variation of "Could be psychological. Could be demonic."

Does evil--as a thing exist? Was Jeffrey Dahmer evil? Was Hitler? Is it a religious concept or a secular one? Is it something that we create or does it come and sit upon the shoulder of the vulnerable, the damaged? And if it exists, what do we do about it? Is there a liberal response to evil that is different from a conservative response?